Site #4.
Antioch (East) Baptist Church

Public elementary school built late 1920s, but not open to African American children until 1965.

First site of Antioch (East) Baptist Church, commemorative bench.

Site #1. First Church Site - 420 Oakdale Road

In 1877 Antioch’s founding pastor, the Rev. A.L. Bryant, bought more than 5 acres of land in the early Edgewood-Candler Park neighborhood, along what is today Oakdale Road in Candler Park. Rev. Bryant made a parcel of that land available for Antioch to build a “brush arbor” there for the growing congregation’s place of worship.

By 1883, Antioch had built their first church building of wood there on the 40-foot x 60-foot site. That year, Rev. Bryan(t) officially sold and deeded the land to Antioch for $1.

Antioch’s official history tells that the congregation continued to grow and worship in that First Church Sanctuary until 1916, when the church was burned.

We have not found a written account of the details of the fire that burned the wooden church to the ground; but the March 1917 Antioch Deacons' hand-written conference minutes confirm the church burning in July 1916.

To acknowledge and pay respects to Antioch’s First Church site, the BiRacial History Project and a small group of Candler Park neighbors created this tribute with the Commemorative Bench and the Legacy Marker at 420 Oakdale Road.

Antioch sold the burned-out property to Mrs. Sallie Miller in 1917. Kelly Jordan purchased the current red brick house and property in 1983. The oldest existing foundation stones may have been supports for the original wooden church.

The Edgewood community’s first Negro school may have been locatedfor a time in the church basement. The 1883 deed of sale to Antioch allowed “for church and school purposes only.” 1898-1908 City of Edgewood Council Minutes document the existence of a separate school for Negro children on the north side of the RR tracks in a basement.